Creatures appear among us and start judging our worthiness. But an ordinary man might just drive them away.

When the Angels came, they took over human affairs with no questions asked. They did not land in a dramatic fleet of round ships, they seemed to come out of the ground overnight, by the millions. They marched directly to places of power and made themselves known. They were not glowing white, nor winged. They looked like humans, with silver clothing and disturbing eyes. People suspected that they were mere projections, images of unknown forces too hideous to view. They called themselves Angels, and proved that they were far superior. That was all humanity needed to know.

The Angels had a very simple policy: they demanded purity.

"What is purity?" people asked one another, first as an aside, later in panic, for the impure were destroyed like worn-out lab rats.

Angels appeared on TV talk-shows to explain. "To understand yet control one's desires, for the good of all."

People gathered in a city squares around the world, huddled together as if their numbers would protect them. Angels spoke from podia, giving their message in the simplest possible terms. "Have you no self-control?"

Tens of thousands of human eyes blinked, none understood.

The silver figures tried to be patient, but this only made them sound more ominous. "Self-control. This is the purity every sentient race has decided upon. You should be proud of your conversion, for Acceptance follows."

Scientists lobbied together to ask: "What is out there? What will accept us?"

"We can only tell the Pure."

Dissent arose. "We want to live!"

Angels stood impassively. "That is not good enough."

Later, on a talk-show, the host confessed. "This purity. We know nothing of it. Is Mercy not a part of your plan?"

"We do give you a chance." Each Angel had a magical symbol, embodied in an eleven-sided die. They tossed their symbols of chaos ... this was the chance they gave. They never disclosed the rules.

Doubts arose immediately. On the news one evening, an announcer threw his water glass at the monitor which scrolled the messages he was expected to read. His face turned red with anger, and the unique fury of those who were doomed. "These creatures must be stopped! Whether human or alien, they bring only holocaust. They offer nothing in return!"

Millions watched the announcer evaporate in a red mist of anger. The other anchorman fainted at the sight. Machines took over the news, spreading words of peace and harmony, and a hope which was utterly alien.

The Angels swept on, door to door. They could see purity like a veil of tears, and America was a sewer that hurt their eyes. Other nations had quickly been reduced to sparse, wandering tribes. Millions were destroyed, yet a few passed their test.

When the Angels stormed into the office of White Cloud Retail, some of the execs tried to run, but there were Angels waiting in the alleys.

"You are not afraid," an Angel said to Abe Cummings.

Abe was a quiet man, with an undistinguished life of lower management woes. He shrugged at the creature who stood before him. "I've done what I could. What happens, happens."

A long critical stare, at nothing he could share.

"Look at my body," the Angel commanded. Its silver garb became a wrinkled mirror, and Abe saw pieces of himself swirl and intermix. He felt lost, falling, but he did not care. He reeled back to his feet, and seemed anchored to the ground, an immovable force of his own. He looked down and saw that he, too, was clothed in silver. The fabric was cool and slippery, like a part of himself reflected, yet it felt like treason.

"You already know one or two of our secrets. You can be one of us." It handed Abe a sacred die, and the world changed as he realized what was happening. His mind spun with glimpses of other worlds, and he fell to the ground, reborn.

From miles above, he saw an Angel touch the secretary, who was a screaming vapor, and then nothing, all in a quick breath. He could feel his powers growing, and falling into place. He clutched the strange alien symbol like a promise of freedom, yet there was a bad taste in his body. The world was a thin sheet of illusion, with nothing underneath. He felt an emptiness, and swirled back to earth ...

Another Angel had cornered his friend Marisa.

"I see one need you cannot control ..."

Marisa cried. "You can't understand!"

"You have 10 seconds to explain."

"You're inhuman!"

The Angel looked at its timepiece.

Marisa's eyes fell on Abe then. She screamed as though her last living hopes had been torn from her bleeding chest. Abe was dazed and disconnected; she was lost and falling. Yet he knew those eyes, from two years of swapping tired smiles, and he had touched the world of the Angels ... the cosmos was an empty beach licked by waves of unfeeling. He wanted the simplicity of life again, and found her eyes. Dark brown hurt, reaching out now ... she wanted to be forgiven. Yes and no: he saw her desire, felt it; he tried it on like a new shirt, it bore his name and clung to his chest with a warmth that no silver lining could ever provide.

"I want ..." she stammered.

Abe pushed the damning Angel aside. "If I am one of you, then she is mine! To me she is pure." Abe cast his die, with the unformed fury of new powers around him. The blank face of Fate came up. "I invoke compassion!"

The Angel stood, hands on strange hips. The moment between Abe and the alien judge was an electric shock. There was a wind of eons, which blasted the desks clean and filled the room with a blowing anguish of damnation. The creature warned, "You have asked for another thousand years of isolation. You wish to remain primitive."

"You would only consume us."

"What do you know of the Promise? You have only felt the suffering of Attunement."

"We, the people," he said, "expect all promises to be broken. No force can undo centuries of experience."

The Angel was coming apart. The silver was running from Abe's body, staining the floor. The Angel's voice was breaking up, but he made one last plea. "You can still be Accepted."

Abe shrugged. "We'll get there on our own."

"Those who were Pure will now be lost ..."

"Whatever happens. Don't wait up for us ..."

The Angel turned sideways and was gone.

Abe and Marisa were alone then: just Marisa, her dark eyes, and himself in human form, powers forgotten. There was a cold blood-flaked office of blowing papers, but that faded soon.

After a silent conference the Angels went home like defeated shadows. The dead never returned, because they never do.

Abe was left with nightmares about space and voices dripping from unseen worlds. Yet there was a shape in his dreams, drifting peacefully through the void. He saw blueprints and spec-files, he wandered the deck, night after night, and took notes on the wonders around him. He gathered survivors, and began building the Ship of Dreams.

=== END ===

Published in Zipzap #3 (web, 1997). This is a weird existential sort of tale. It came directly from a dream, and I still feel that capturing dreams is a good thing. In dreams, pieces of the world are free to blend in ways that the formula of fiction would otherwise deny.